QUESTION: Whatever happened to the right-turn lane being constructed on the H-1 Kinau Street offramp to improve ambulance access to the Queen’s Medical Center and clear up traffic congestion at the Ward Avenue intersection?

ANSWER: The turn lane that will provide access to westbound Lusitana Street from the offramp and shorten the route ambulance drivers take to the hospital has been completed, a spokesman for Queen’s said Wednesday.

But it will remain closed for an indefinite amount of time until safety improvements to surrounding intersections are completed, said Todd Kanja, director of engineering services at Queen’s. The improvements were added to the project after construction began.

"We want to be sure that everything is safe and everything is completed," Kanja said.

Those traffic improvements include adding new street signs, curbing and street lights to the Kinau Street intersections of Lusitana Street, Lunalilo Street and Alapai Street to increase pedestrian safety.

The joint project by Queen’s and the state Department of Transportation was originally scheduled to be completed in May 2011, but the additional projects have put it roughly a year behind schedule.

"A lot of the delays have been tied into trying to take care of this traffic improvement work that was added to the scope after the project was initiated," Kanja said.

He estimated that the improvements will take about three months to complete once construction begins, but he said Queen’s doesn’t know when that will be.

"We don’t have a confirmed start date, but I understand it’s supposed to be sometime soon," he said.

Because the $8.8 million project is federally funded, the mid-project changes had to first be approved by the federal government before construction could move forward, a Department of Transportation spokesman said.

Queen’s also had to secure designs and the necessary permits for the improvements, which takes time, Kanja said.

"After things got started, that’s when we identified that traffic improvements needed to be designed and permitted, and that’s taken a little longer," Kanja said.

The project officially began in April 2010 and was also postponed for about a month in February 2010 because of technical problems with the existing ramp.

Kanja said the delays and additions to the project will increase the overall cost, but he’s not sure by how much.

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This update was written by Sarah Zoellick. Suggest a topic for “Whatever Happened To …” by writing Honolulu Star-Advertiser, 500 Ala Moana Blvd., Suite 7-210, Honolulu 96813; call 529-4747; or email cityeditors@staradvertiser.com.